In rainy, snowy, and icy weather conditions, the steady accumulation of water, ice, and falling snow upon the roadway surface is a very great automotive vehicle and occupant hazard. Such accumulations will cause the vehicle wheels to slide on the roadway surface during breaking, turning, coming into and leaving curves, and even, at times, during normal driving. This sliding is referred to as hydroplaning, and it results in the vehicles wheels losing frictional engagement with the roadway surface thereby preventing the driver to properly steer the vehicle, and often losing complete control of the vehicle. Thus, every year tens of thousands of automotive vehicle collisions and accidents occur, damaging and destroying thousands of vehicles and, more significantly, injuring, maiming and killing tens of thousands of individuals. In addition, debris on the roadway, ranging from chunks of broken road, shredded tractor trailer tires, branches, cardboard, etc., causes numerous accidents from the vehicle driver either hitting the debris or swerving to avoid the debris. Thus it is desirable to provide vehicle owners with systems or devices that allow the driver to avoid, or at least minimize, the various hazards he or she faces when driving on debris strewn, ice and snow covered roadways.
The prior art discloses a number of systems and devices for heating and melting snow and ice from the wheels, wheel wells, or area adjacent the vehicle wheels.
For example, the Makinson patent (U.S. Pat. No. 4,063,606) discloses an anti-hydroplaning device that includes a blower driven by the engine and to which a pair of hoses are connected, with the nozzles of the hoses adjacent the front of each front tire for discharging high velocity air streams immediately ahead of the vehicle tires.
The Ricci patent (U.S. Pat. No. 4,203,423) discloses a vehicle safety system that includes a tubular-shaped body having an internal valve, and which connected to the vehicle exhaust system, and four conduits extending from the body so that exhaust gases can be discharged from the conduit to the front and rear tread surfaces of the vehicle driving wheels.
The Schittino et al. patent (U.S. Pat. No. 4,324,307) discloses a snow/ice melter that includes a y-shaped stub pipe that is interconnected to the vehicle exhaust pipe by a flexible, detachable u-shaped tube connection wherein the stub pipe has flexible tubes that diverge therefrom for mounting adjacent the vehicle wheels so that hot exhaust gases can be discharged onto the traction surfaces adjacent the vehicle drive wheels.
The Ahmed patent (U.S. Pat. No. 4,848,510) discloses a vehicle snow and ice melting system that includes a blower unit interconnected to the vehicle exhaust pipe and from which conduits extend for directing hot exhaust gases to the areas proximate the vehicle drive wheels.
The Roach patent (U.S. Pat. No. 6,021,843) discloses a snow melting apparatus for wheel wells that includes tubing extending from the vehicle radiator and which is controlled by a valve that connects to a line-splitter which branches into two feeder lines that are mounted to the wheels so that warm water can be circulated therethrough, and from the feeder lines are return lines that connect to the radiator for forming a closed heating system.
The Donastorg patent (U.S. Pat. No. 6,488,217 B1) discloses an anti-hydroplaning system for vehicles that includes blower assemblies disposed adjacent the vehicle tires and which is connected to an air compressor unit, a heater/reservoir tank, and a compressed air storage tank for supplying the blower assemblies with a pressurized stream of mixed and heated air and liquid for melting snow and ice adjacent the vehicle tires.
Nonetheless, despite the ingenuity of the above devices, there remains a need for a device for melting snow and ice from the roadway and which can be mounted on new vehicles or sold as an after-market additional safety feature.